I’ve been feeling rather verklempt as this final semester begins. It’s the first semester since my freshman year, barring study abroad, that I won’t be on leadership with Intervarsity, a campus ministry at my school. I have absolutely loved getting to contribute to the organization from a leadership position and being pushed to grow by my team members, and it’s a weird feeling to step out of those roles.
But the end of my time on IV leadership does not mean the end of my ministry at Elon or pre-Race: God has a purpose for these few months. And in asking him what that ministry looks like now, he reminded me that one facet of it is this blog.
You may have noticed I haven’t posted very frequently. Well, let me tell you why.
Somewhere during the course of those month-long gaps between posts, I realized something about myself: I’m a lot more of a perfectionist than I give myself credit for.
I’m an English major through and through, and an editor to boot. I don’t do imperfect prose: I publish only writing that has been revisited, reread, reviewed and revised until I consider it immaculate, fit for the public eye. I don’t do verbal vomit (at least, not where people can read it). I have a reputation as a beautiful writer to uphold, guys! I can’t share anything that doesn’t shine with elegant perfection.
Moreover, I hate being wrong, and I’m truly terrified of sharing anything that is theologically incorrect (more on that in a future post. I promise there will be future posts!).
Confession: I currently have five posts sitting quietly in my Google drive, waiting with mounting impatience to be published. Five! Five posts that have been written, but not shared with the world.
I’m not hesitating to post because I lack ideas. On the contrary, I have dozens! No, the reason this blog lies silent for weeks at a time boils down to two things: pride and fear.
My perfectionism indicates many things about the way I think of myself and the way I view God. That spirit pridefully seeks my own glory in promoting my own skill and talent with words (and perhaps magnifies that out of proportion. I mean, shine with elegant perfection? Really?). Therefore, it refuses to permit the shame of a post with a syllable–or worse, a comma–out of place. That arrogant spirit also tells me that God can only work through perfect posts: that a flawed, unedited, rough piece of writing is inadequate and unworthy.
Out of that comes fear: fear of being wrong and of being judged. What if people who know what they’re talking about way more than I do tell me my arguments off base? What if people read my words and don’t like my writing? What if I accidentally say something insensitive or offensive or hurtful and someone gets upset? I don’t want that at all.
So I hesitate and then I post and then I pause.
And that pause goes on for an absurdly long time, especially when compared with the number of posts in my queue.
But tonight I realized that if this blog is my ministry, I’ve not been letting God use it. Rather, I’ve been letting the enemy step in and take control of my pride and my fear and stop me from sharing God’s work on the platform he’s given me. All those drafts hanging out in my Google drive are ineffective if they never make it to the blog.
Because here’s an essential truth: all that perfectionism, that self-glorification, that need to be right, to be perfect, that crippling fear–
That’s not the Gospel.
That’s not the life God wants for me. That’s what Jesus died to save me from! HE is enough, his power is enough, his grace is enough. I don’t have to be perfect. I don’t have to have the perfect words or the perfect thoughts. I don’t have to have it all together, in life or on this blog. God is so much greater than a neatly edited text, and he can work through even an unedited smattering of verbal vomit. And so I don’t have to fear, because it’s not about me. It’s about Jesus.
Because guys, the work is already finished. Christ already has the victory. I don’t have to write better to make that work more finished, because it never depended on me in the first place.
To be clear, I think intentionally seeking to do my best on this blog is a good thing. For me, writing is a gift I want to use to glorify God. Sloppily slapping up any old scribbling would not serve that purpose in the least. But succumbing to a spirit of perfectionism takes it altogether too far in the other direction such that I start seeking my own glory rather than God’s and then in pounces the enemy, all ready to make this ministry ineffective.
So I’m asking you for grace when I don’t publish perfect posts. I’m asking you not to condemn my writing or my thoughts. And I’m asking this of myself, too. I am my own harshest critic, and I need to learn to give myself grace.
Because my Father in heaven isn’t condemning me. No, he tells me, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. I pray that I may emulate Paul’s response: Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 2 Corinthians 12:9
I read somewhere recently that God does not ask for a perfect heart, but only a willing one. Somewhere in the mire of perfectionism and pauses between posts, my willingness, so enthusiastic in the beginning, slowly slipped away. Now, I’m kicking away the pride entangling my heart and my fingers, keeping them from pressing the post button. I’m rejecting the fear that holds me back from sharing my heart on this blog. And I’m claiming the promise of the Gospel over every word I write.
For I will never be perfect in this world. But Jesus is, so I don’t have to be.
